Trial lecture - time and place
The trial lecture will take place on October 30th from 10:15 - 11:00 in auditorium U40.
Adjudication committee
- Assistant Professor Kelsie Gayle Rodenbiker, University of Copenhagen
- Professor Matthias Schmidt, Justus Liebig University Giessen
- Senior Lecturer Vemund Blomkvist, Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo
Chair of Defence
- Dean Anne Hege Grung, Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo
Supervisors
- Professor Anders Runesson, Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo
- Professor Marianne Bjelland-Kartzow, Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo
Abstract
Over the past century, Pauline scholarship has seen a marked resurgence, particularly regarding the apostle's soteriology, examined through various interpretative frameworks. Yet the letters to Timothy and Titus have frequently been sidelined in these discussions, rarely treated as significant to this theme. Addressing this imbalance, the present study examines First and Second Timothy and Titus individually, engaging a key issue in Pauline scholarship: the nature and discursive function of "salvation."
Building on a Ricœurian framework of language and discourse, the thesis outlines the contours of the sōzō word group as it connects to concepts of salvation in Greco-Roman, Jewish, and Pauline discursive milieus, noting the concept's fluidity, centred primarily on maintaining the good life or securing protection in danger. Through an innovative appropriation of Discourse Analysis, the thesis traces semantic networks in key pericopes, using an analytical prism of content, timing, and agency to unveil the deep semantics of salvation in these letters.
The thesis concludes that 2 Timothy stands apart in its stronger eschatological and pneumatic view of the present, producing a salvific discourse in which temporal aspects—possibly shaped by Jewish apocalyptic thought—emerge as proleptic. Regarding agency, John Barclay's taxonomy of gift-giving reveals that divine salvation is marked by a certain reciprocity, with nuances between the letters. Conceptual connections to Stoic thought also surface, particularly in 1 Timothy, whose discourse carries a stronger synergetic tone than the other two; there, salvation's embodied and enacted nature is construed epistemically as a path of growth in truth. Titus is closely related in this regard but shows more of a virtue-ethical pattern, in which salvation is best described as ethical transformation: it reinterprets Greek civic virtues Christologically, relativises ethnic parameters (Jewish or Greek), and connects salvation to a visually framed paideia of beauty. In 2 Timothy, by contrast, salvation revolves around the victory of life demonstrated in the Messiah's resurrection.
These varying portrayals do not cohere into a unified soteriological concept across the three letters. While 1 Timothy and Titus align more closely, the study argues against treating the epistles as a single entity; to preserve their distinctiveness, they should be read as individual contributions to the Pauline heritage.